Major donors and teens catch inauguration fever

A diverse group of San Diegans is heading east for the presidential inauguration on Monday. Major donors Irwin and Joan Jacobs, who recently returned from Southeast Asia, are traveling there with other family members.

North Park bakery owner Lachlan Oliver not only won tickets to the inauguration through Congresswoman Susan Davis’s lottery but was invited to Monday night’s Commander-in-Chief’s Inaugural Ball, thanks to his work with local wounded warriors.

Local Democratic Party leader Jess Durfee, who just relinquished his post this week, and MaryAnne Pintar, the San Diego office administrator of newly elected Congressman Scott Peters, also will be in the Washington, D.C. crowd. So will San Diego attorney Janice Brown and San Diego City Club founder George Mitrovich.

But the ceremony will double as a live classroom for about 50 La Jolla Country Day School students from throughout San Diego and faculty. The students will not only observe the festivities but interview attendees for a government project.

Results pending: A humble internship application letter from a San Diego State student to a Wall Street firm has gone more viral than this season’s flu.

National news sources spread the story of finance student Matthew Ross, 22, who emailed a down-to-earth, understated job query to New York investment banking firm Duff & Phelps Monday. His email was quickly forwarded to colleagues and even other firms.

But did he get the job?

Alex Wolfe, communications head of Duff & Phelps, confirmed Thursday his firm talked to Ross this week and hopes to meet him in person next week. In light of the scrutiny the financial services industry has been under lately, “his letter really resonated,” Wolfe said. “It broke through the clutter as authentic and refreshing... nearly every comment in the email chain was effusive in its praise, and this is a tough crowd. We’re grateful and flattered he reached out to us.”

A last goodbye: Judie Italiano, former head of the 4,500-member San Diego Municipal Employees Association for 20 years, passed away unexpectedly in her sleep on Dec. 23 in her Canby, Ore. home. Italiano resigned from the MEA in 2009 and, in 2010, was awarded a $700,000 settlement from the city of San Diego retirement board in a much publicized legal battle over her pension.

Her son, Jonathan Hayes, says the public is invited to her memorial service at 10 a.m. Jan. 26 in Balboa Park’s Recital Hall. She became involved with the MEA in the early ‘80s because she wanted to fight for equal pay of woman at the city, said Hayes. Her dedication to improving the lives of her fellow workers (and her famous cookies) brought an increasingly significant role in the union leadership. “It will be nice to see and hear from the people whom my mother knew and helped throughout her career,” said Hayes.

VIP visits:Robert Pera, the majority owner of the Memphis Grizzlies basketball team who once was among the 10 youngest to appear on Forbes’ list of world billionaires, visited the UC San Diego campus last week. The high-tech entrepreneur and founder of Ubiquiti Networks, 34, hardly needed a tour, though. Pera received both his undergraduate and graduate degrees from UCSD …

Marion “Suge” Knight founder and CEO of Black Kapital Records, dropped in at Quality Social club downtown Saturday night. Wearing sunglasses and a white football jacket, he conversed with fans and told QS Entertainment Director Nicole Novak he was checking out spots for an upcoming event. The former CEO of Death Row Records which popularized rap artists Tupac Shakur, Dr. Dre, Snoop Dogg and others, was in town with troublemaker poster boy, comedian Katt Williams.